(In this post, Dane Prokofiev returns to NCS with a new installment in his Keyboard Warriors series, in which he poses unpredictable questions to metal writers of all kinds. Here, he interviews our friend Tom Campagna.)

Pokémon and metal. You never thought these two words would appear in the same sentence, eh? The two objects seem like polar opposites, sharing a relationship resembling the one shared between light and darkness, hot and cold, truth and Tyranny of Tradition, God and Satan, etc.

But metal writer Tom Campagna (ex-The Number of the Blog, ex-Metal Injection), who is an ardent fan of the Pokémon role-playing videogames, thinks the two share similarities. As one of those dudes pining to be “the very best like no one ever was,” you really wonder how he still finds the time to teach high school mathematics, write for About.com Heavy Metal, and occasionally contribute articles to some other metal websites.

Why do you like metal?

I love metal because of the excellent release of emotions that one has while listening to it. The history of the genre is also something that really strikes me as important, too. For a kid who was constantly quizzed by my father about “who is this band” and “what song is this,” I kind of developed that into my own world of music.The small size of the scene is also nice because you can certainly talk to members of your favorite band and sense the sheer level of appreciation from these individuals. People who scoff at heavy metal have never given the genre a chance; but if everybody loved heavy metal like I do, the scene would be enormous, and we wouldn’t want that would we? Continue reading »